Getting to Know

It’s a wonder Tera and Mike Barz ever went on one date, let alone became a couple. At WFLD-TV in Chicago, they worked opposite schedules: she as a nightside anchor and reporter and he a morning news anchor. Then there was her strict policy against dating co-workers, and the fact that he thought she was always giving him the cold shoulder. Clearly, they both had it wrong since they’re now married, with 8-month-old daughter Taylor, and co-anchor Action News’ morning show.Stay tuned for more on Tera and Mike, right after this sentence…

• Mike and his Indiana University fraternity brothers won the Little 500, a cycling competition that inspired the Oscar-winning film Breaking Away. Tera, who holds a black belt in tae kwon do, beat a Volusia County Sheriff’s Office deputy in a turkey shoot when she was 16.
• On their first date, they went to a bar to watch a Chicago Cubs game. And for the record, Tera, 32, asked him out—via text message. She says she was so smitten that night she found herself dancing in the ladies restroom.
• Living in cold weather states for most of his life, Mike says the Florida weather makes him feel like a little kid right before summer vacation.
• Tera grew up idolizing Diane Sawyer. Mike was inspired by the late Peter Jennings.
• Among the kooky things they’ve done on the air, Mike, 41, did a weather forecast while dressed as a Hooters girl (another time he wore nothing but a Speedo), and Tera ate a live cicada (as a kid she used to eat worms).
• Around the station, Tera’s known for her robot impression. One morning during a commercial break, pro wrestler The Pope challenged her to a “robot-off.” (Check it out for yourself on YouTube.)
• Mike says whenever he goes back to Chicago, where he hasn’t been on-air for well over a year, at least one person will say to him, “I watch you every morning.” That won’t happen in Jacksonville since they don’t plan on ever leaving Northeast Florida. “Before we moved, we wanted to find a place where we could spend the rest of our lives,” Tera says. “And we found it.”